Tags
almost done, Facebook, forums, juggling, publishing, social networking, time management, Twitter, writing
Several concepts that don’t mix well, eh?
Mood: sleepy Listening to: Purity, by Mythos Book status: 98.5K. Started the climactic scene.I’m getting there. I’m very, very close.
This has been slow, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that I dropped everything 6 weeks ago to join my husband in The Great American House Hunt (successfully concluded).
I’ve spent the bulk of the year it’s taken me to get WEAVE to this exalted almost-complete state struggling with something that wasn’t a problem for me when I was writing SWORD and SONG: time management. Sure, I read a ridiculous amount, and that has to be, to some measure, sacrificed when you’ve got a writing schedule. And I have a day job, which takes 8 hours of conscious mental redirection out of five of my weekdays. And I do, despite all evidence to the contrary, have a social life, one I enjoy and occasionally spend too much time thinking about.
And then, more importantly, there’s this. . And this.
But outside of that I still managed to turn out a not-too-shabby first draft in about 8 months. Twice, I did this. So what’s different?
Well, this blog, for starters. 🙂
And Twitter. I didn’t have that before. And Facebook. Add in several writer’s forums and a compulsive need to keep abreast of the latest news in the publishing industry, and well, you’ve got a hell of a time suck.
I got these things because I need them: because writers are no longer eccentric hermits pounding at keyboards from cabins in the middle of the woods: we have public faces now, even before we get published, even before we have a hope of getting published. One of the first things my (former) agent said when I signed with her was “you should get a blog. And a Facebook account.” And I didn’t need to ask why: I’d been around writer’s forums long enough, by then, to understand why she was suggesting it. So I bit the bullet and threw myself out there.
And I’ve enjoyed it.
And bitched. Because here I am at 7:00 am. I should be finishing my OMGTENSE climactic scene and launching into the probably-too-long denouement, but I’ve been a lax blogger lately, so that came first. After this, I’ll post it on FB and Twitter, a few writer’s forums, and then go get ready for work. I do enjoy it –I enjoy it all a little too much, actually– but you can see the problem.
Is this an argument against social networking for writers? No.
Hell no. I’ve learned more from following agents and editors on Twitter in the last year than I learned in the preceding two reading essays and books on the industry. I’ve met more writers through these sites, and wonderful forums like AW, that I could have hoped to trying to network face-to-face, and it was free. I’ve gotten amazing advice and feedback from these people. I have a support network, something I was definitely lacking before, and needed badly. When I hop back on the Querymobile this time, I’ll know so much more about how it should work, and I will have a much stronger book.
These things are invaluable to me.
And yet. It’s a lot of balls to keep in the air at once, and I just don’t multitask well at the creative level, I guess.
So, being a bad juggler, I think I’m going back to rigid scheduling. I’ve let that go, and I guess it was not for the best. I will blog 3 times a week –hopefully– and I think I’m going to ask the Mr. to set our router up to turn off the internet between 5 and 7 in the morning, and maybe for an hour in the evening as well. We used to have it set up this way, but then I decided I could handle it all. Hah.
So here goes. I’m hoping by this time next week I’ll be triumphantly announcing THE END.